I think the female writer discerning a difference between the sins of Woody Allen and Michael Jackson makes good points. I'm not fully on board, but I see what she is driving at. I think.
Yet here is what I think she gets deeply wrong. Everything was covered up and hush-hush years ago, but abuse of even very young women was tolerated as a "Hollywood thing," or considered almost typical and therefore unimportant in other subcultures as well. Roman Polanski - who also abused boys, including one of my very sad and suicidal patients years ago - is an example of this, even defended by Whoopi Goldberg that it wasn't "rape rape." Young women went to Hollywood and were expected to put out for parts, and everyone looked the other way. Goes with the territory. That is less true now, but I don't know where tolerance will stabilise. It is now regarded in some circles as especially evil, and the men who engage in such extortion should be punished. Which is fine.
But the continued tolerance for Michael Jackson doesn't really have much to do with the difference between collaborative and individual artistic fields, or between movies and music. Few are interested, because the current fashion is to be concerned about young white women. It still doesn't matter if boys 10-17 of any color are abused.
#MeToo needs to keep alive the memory of No Child Left Behind. Not that it's their job more than other people's, but it is good to remember "And while we're at it..."
Sophocles' seven extant plays are masterpieces and well worth your while, even if his contemporaries did say he was a pederast (which was regarded as a mere peccadillo at the time).
ReplyDeleteNote: I am not defending Sophocles in any way; just pointing out that a masterpiece have value even if the person...
ReplyDeleteThis approach to art leaves me a little cold. I can get with the idea of not encouraging a bad actor by supporting his commercial enterprise, possibly even refusing to support the commercial enterprises of other people who are continuing to include him. Once he's dead, no. I guess the heirs will have to make up their own minds whether it's dirty money they've inherited.
ReplyDeleteThe whole thing is too much like virtue-signaling, especially if it's fodder for articles explaining whom you're boycotting this week and whether your boycott list is shinier than everyone else's. It's the Princess and the Pea, showing off her bruises.
I was referring to the "Week" article, of course, not your post.
ReplyDelete